Sporting events, newsworthy events, and other live phenomena are often transmitted live to users, who receive the live streams using a variety of devices. For example, a basketball game may be broadcast live to users watching the game on television sets, mobile phones, tablet computers, or other types of devices.
Hereinafter, a “live” stream of events refers to the transmission of data as near in time to the actual time of the occurrence of the events as is technologically possible or permissible by the transmitting entity. For example, live broadcasts of award shows or games are often slightly delayed intentionally to be able to capture and prevent the transmission of undesirable happenings in those shows or games. Such artificially introduced delays and delays caused by the processing of the signals do not distract from such transmissions being regarded as live within the scope of the illustrative embodiments.
Hereinafter, “main” content refers to the content or data that is primarily sought to be transmitted live, e.g. the content produced from the live events such as sporting events, ceremonies, etc. “Secondary” content refers to content other than the main content and which is obtained from a source other than the source of the main content. For example, advertising content provided by advertising content providers, which interrupts or overlays the main content provided by a provider covering a live event, can be regarded as example secondary content.
Presently, the placement of the secondary content within a transmission is statically pre-defined. For example, 2-minute commercial breaks—when the main content is interrupted and the secondary content is transmitted—may be planned at 9 minutes, 16 minutes, and 24 minutes in a 30-minute transmission of the main content. Regardless of the main content, the commercial breaks occur at those preset times (9, 16, and 24 minutes) for preset intervals (2 minutes).
The illustrative embodiments recognize that the static method of inserting the secondary content into the transmission of the main content can be disruptive to the main content. For example, at 9 minutes, the main content may be at or approaching a climactic event when the static insertion of the secondary content interrupts the main content.
The illustrative embodiments recognize that the users are often displeased by such poorly timed interruptions. The illustrative embodiments recognize that dynamically determining a suitable time for inserting secondary content into a main content transmission will be useful.
An event in the main content is regarded as climactic when the event satisfies a set of features which render the event of a significantly greater interest to a user as compared to another event in the main content. For example, while a football game as a whole may be exciting, an event where a user's favorite team scores a touchdown is significantly more exciting—of significantly greater interest—to the user as compared to, say, when the team moves the ball a few yards. One would say that touchdown events are climactic in a live broadcast of a football game. A user is deemed to have a significantly greater degree of aversion towards interrupting a main content transmission for secondary content insertion when a climactic event is likely, than otherwise.
A non-climactic period is a period during which a climactic event has a greater than a threshold probability of not occurring. A user is deemed to have a significantly greater degree of acceptance towards interrupting a main content transmission for secondary content insertion during a non-climactic period, than otherwise.
The illustrative embodiments further recognize that different users can relate to, associate with, or otherwise respond to different climactic events. For example, in a live telecast of a game between a team from New York and a team from Dallas, a user who is a fan of the team from New York is likely to regard as climactic those events where the New York team scores, whereas a user who is a fan of the team from Dallas is likely to regard as climactic those events where the Dallas team scores. Similarly, one user may regard comic events as climactic and another user may regard suspenseful events as climactic. For a variety of reasons, different users can and do have different events that they regard as climactic.
The illustrative embodiments recognize that not only is dynamically determining the insertion points for secondary content useful, the dynamic insertion can be tailored to individual user's preferences for climactic events. The secondary content can then be inserted in a non-climactic period of the main content transmission such that the non-climactic period is specific to the user's preferences.
The illustrative embodiments further recognize that improving the forecasting of climactic events and non-climactic periods is beneficial. The illustrative embodiments recognize that obtaining validation of a forecast from an actual user who is receiving the actual transmission is a good way to improve the forecasts.
The illustrative embodiments recognize that a user has to be incentivized to participate in providing feedback or other validation of a forecasted non-climactic period. As described herein, a live transmission is often artificially delayed for a variety of reasons. The illustrative embodiments recognize that altering the delay in the live streaming to a particular user in relation to the user's participation in the forecast validation, as a reward for such participation, is therefore useful.
A forecast validation is a manner of seeking user feedback about the forecast. A forecast validation can take the form of a question presented to the user, to which the user can respond using appropriate technology. A pre-insertion validation is a query configured to ask substantially whether the user agrees that the forecasted non-climactic period is unlikely to include a climactic event. The pre-insertion validation is presented before the secondary content in inserted into the transmission.
A post-insertion validation is a query configured to ask substantially whether the user observing the transmission actually did not miss any climactic events while the inserted secondary content was transmitted during the forecasted non-climactic period. The post-insertion validation is presented after the transmission of the inserted secondary content has completed.
An active user is a user who responds to a pre-insertion validation, post-insertion validation, or both. An active users group is a group comprised of active users. A passive user is a user who has not responded to any verification questions in at least a determined past period. A non-human device, such as a recording device, can be a passive user.
An activity-based ranking of an active user within the active users group is a standing or rank of the user relative to other users in the active users group, and is determined by a computation that user a number of validation responses provided by the user, how quickly the user responded to a validation question (a speed at which the user responded), or some combination of these and other similarly purposed factors.
A base delay in a live transmission is a fixed delay or lag configured in the transmission by the main content provider. A dynamic delay is an additional delay that can be configured by an embodiment. An event portrayed in the live transmission is therefore delayed by base delay plus dynamic delay. The dynamic delay can be user-specific, i.e., different for different users.